I wonder when we will stop trying to match the scenery
Embrace our unconventional expressions,
And stop trying to impress the masses with impressionism

Maybe we could embrace diversity like cubism
Instead of clinging to tradition like baroque
Stop trying to engage is these neo-classical conversations

Beauty should not be determined by how others perceive you,
But how you perceive yourself
And know your beauty
Because each and everyone of us are just a gallery…

Of working masterpieces

Egocentric Imbalances

5 feet, 11 inches, & High Rising
If I got any higher
My elevation might cause a nose bleed,
Or a fracture in my ear drums
Because limits exist for a reason
My ego might rip apart if it gets any larger,
Expanding to the point of implosion
A psychological black hole
Vacuuming any praise and glory found
With an exponential rate of cognitive damnation
Until everything is broken down
Chaotic fragments
Lost in a chasm of self-destruction
The ashes of arrogant thought in its most dangerous form,
The aftermath of mental Armageddon

Mischief night

The night before Halloween
As houses prepare to be covered
In egg yolks and toilet paper streamers
I fear the worse

Glass broken
Candy burglarizing
Carjacking
Murder

Okay so maybe these are just exaggerations,
But when you deal with enough bullies all of your childhood,
Expect them to still exist in the realm of adulthood
And expect their actions to only intensify,

Not everyone is mature just because they age
I fear mostly for the kids out on this night
Maybe I watch too many ABC family movies
You know the movies where the parents go out for a party
Try to enjoy themselves
Leaving the older sibling to watch the younger one

Both too old for “adult” parties
One too old to go trick or treating himself
The younger can trick or treat away
Then the two siblings both find themselves
Surrounded by a gang of bullies
This is where our adventure to somewhere or for something fun and magical begins

Unfortunately life isn’t an ABC Family Halloween Special
It’s cold and callous,
Happy endings aren’t impossible,
Just highly unlikely
Escaping your bullies is not as easy of a stance,
As the media makes it look

I know I could have used an older brother
Walking me from block to block as a kid
Hoping I would not get beaten,
Candy is a hell of a drug it can make these kids do crazy things
Even going it alone
I was one of those kids,
And lucky to be alive

The fear of getting jumped
While dressed in my charlie brown ghost costume
Never went away
Never stopped me from trembling
With shaky hands while holding my paper bag
Hoping for candy to spill instead of my baby teeth,
And blood dripping from my gums

Now I sit on these nights, like a worried parent
Pretending like he has a kid of his own
When he really worries generally
Hoping Mischief night
Has become safer for kids,
But hope doesn’t console me,
It’s just all I can do at this point

A Look Out the Window

I stare out the window
As a mix of cloudy and sunny are placed in my worldview
Re-imagining a future where ice frost covers the steel rivets of my window pane,
Until all I can see is snow slowly fracturing the glass

Some call it a winter wonderland, but I call it a “blunder-land”
Filled with ice slicks and snowstorms
Autumn leaves could never be this cruel
But these fall colors

These pumpkin patch visits
And ever changing leaves
Are a reminder of the next season to follow suite: Winter
Not before long the pumpkin patch will be a vegetation graveyard

Filled with dormant plant corpses frozen in icy tundra
Not before long all of the leaves will fall off of their branches
The trees will be exposed as wooden skeletons dried out by the season’s whim
Avalanches, blizzards, and snow surges

Plague my mind like a 10th century European village
As I fear the worst,
Maybe I am over-thinking,
But it’s hard to chill out…

When you fear the world as you know it is freezing up!

J.B. Stone is an emerging poet/ fiction writer; originally from Brooklyn, NY now residing in Buffalo, NY. Stone also has poetry featured in The Occulum, In Between Hangovers and Anti-Heroin Chic, along with a flash fiction featured on 121Words.com’s Summer Collection Vol. II.